learn, and not upon be as much univer- h the arts of killing gram to come from be support of public tening necessary in QUESTIONS FOR READING AND DISCUSSION 1. The authors of these letters assumed that the president and other New Dealers would listen to their grievances. Why did they appeal to such high, distant officials? If they did not like their jobs, why didn't they find another place to work or get a better education? Why didn't they ask their employers for better wages, hours, and working conditions? 2. What assumptions did the letter writers make about government? What did they want the government to do? 3. Several letters refer to the American standard of living. What defined that stan- dard? In what ways did the authors of these letters believe they fell short of that standard2 How could they achieve it? 4. To what extent had New Deal measures made a difference in their lives? ...00 T-Mobile LTE it with people who In what ways were How would it dif- rogram differ from Describes ther . igrant farmworkers, ng the parched fields two college students bord migrants music White House to play north of Los Angeles, worker. His inter- a better wages. Flores they exercised their DOCUMENT 24-3 Huey Long Proposes Redistribution of Wealth The inadequacy of New Deal reforms to reduce the poverty and suffering of many Ameri cans created support for more drastic measures. Huey Long, U.S. senator from Louisiana, organized the Share Our Wealth Society with the professed goal to guarantee a measure of security and well-being to all Americans. Long's proposals attracted a large following among the many people mired in the lingering depression and pressured Roosevelt to consider more far-reaching efforts of relief and reform. Long's ideas, expressed in the fol- lowing speech to a group of supporters in 1935, revealed the widespread perception that, while affluent people remained comfortable, the New Deal did not do enough to protect most Americans from economic misery and insecurity. "Throughout the Nation, men and women, forgotten in the political philoso- phy of the Government for the last years, look to us here for guidance and for a more equitable opportunity to share in the distribution of the national wealth." It therefore seemed that all we had to do was to elect our candidate and that then my object in public life would be accomplished. But a few nights before the Presidential election I listened to Mr. Herbert Hoover deliver his speech in Madison Square Garden, and he used these words: "My conception of America is a land where men and women may walk in ordered liberty, where they may enjoy the advantages of wealth, not concentrated in the hands of a few, but diffused through the lives of all." So it seems that so popular had become the demand for a redistribution of wealth in America that Mr. Hoover had been compelled to somewhat yield to that for which Mr. Roosevelt had previously declared without reservation. It is not out of place for me to say that the support which I brought to Mr. Roosevelt to secure his nomination and election as President-and without which it was hardly probable he would ever have been nominated-was on the assur ances which I had that he would take the proper stand for the redistribution of wealth in the campaign. He did that much in the campaign, but after his election, what then? I need not tell you the story. We have not time to cry over our disap pointments, over promises which others did not keep, and over pledges which were broken. We have not a moment to lose. It was after my disappointment over the Roosevelt policy, after he became President, that I saw the light. I soon began to understand that, regardless of what we had been promised, our only chance of securing the fulfillment of such pledges was to organize the men and the women of the United States so that they were a force capable of action, and capable of requiring such a policy from the lawmakers and from the President after they took office. That was the beginning of the Share Our Wealth Society movement. We now have enough societies and enough members, to say nothing of the well-wishers, who-if they will put their shoulders to the wheel and give us one-half of the time which they do not need for anything else--can force the principles of the Share Our Wealth Society to the fore-front, to where no person participating in national affairs can ignore them further. We are calling upon people whose souls cannot be cankered by the lure of wealth and corruption. We are calling upon people who have at heart, above their own nefarious possessions, the welfare of this country and of its humanity. We are calling upon them, we are calling upon you, we are calling upon the people of America, upon the men and women who love this country, and who would save their children and their neighbors from calamity and distress, to call in the people whom they know, to acquaint them with the purpose of this society and secure organization and cooperation among everyone willing to lend his hand to this worthy work. Fear of ridicule? Fear of reprisal? Fear of being taken off of the star- vation dole? It is too late for our people to have such fears. I have undergone them all. There is nothing under the canopy of heaven which has not been sent to ridi- cule and embarrass my efforts in this work. And yet, despite such ridicule, face to face in any argument I have yet to see the one of them who dares to gainsay the principle to share our wealth. On the contrary, when their feet are put to the fire each and every one of them declare that they are in favor of sharing the wealth, and the redistribution of wealth. But then some get suddenly ignorant and say instructure-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com C 3:05 PM B. Migrant 41 p here in El Rio.... Lilies are in a good an obtain from the te those clothes to s the employment his ranch, we try to Speech to Members of the Share Our Wealth Society, 1935 For 20 years I have been in the battle to provide that, so long as America has, or can produce, an abundance of the things which make life comfortable and happy that none should own so much of the things which he does not need and cannot use as to deprive the balance of the people of a reasonable proportion of the necessities and conveniences of life. The whole line of my political thought has always been that America must face the time when the whole country would shoulder the obligation which it owes to every child born on earth-that is, a fair chance to life, liberty, and happiness. I had been in the United States Senate only a few days when I began my effort to make the battle for a distribution of wealth among all the people a national issue for the coming elections. On July 2, 1932, pursuant to a promise made, I heard Franklin Delano Roosevelt, accepting the nomination of the Democratic Party at the Chicago convention for President of the United States, use the follow- ing words: 1 81% editor. Audio from on Library of Con- 15b1. From Congressional Record, 74th Cong, 2nd Sess, vol. 79 (no. 107) (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1935), 8333-36. vocations of life, to be regulated on the capacity of chil the ability of parents to pay the costs. Training for life's sal and thorough for all walks in life as has been the tr 8. The raising of revenue and taxes for the supporto the reduction of swollen fortunes from the top, as well works to give employment whenever there may be a private enterprise. 2 of 4 and not much u arts of ki i to come port of 3 necess OR READING AND DISCUSSION migrant farmworkers in the FSA camp at El Rio, according to Flores? the camp differ from their previous residence? Why were they om the company-owned camps"? he FSA camp help the farmworkers "to stick together"? Why was it to them to stick together? What challenges did they confront in stick- er? Flores think about "Okies"? Why? n used the terms "Mexicans" and "Mexican people." What do you e terms meant to him and the other farmworkers in the camp? What m "Mexican greasers" mean? What did Flores mean by "American"? xtent did he consider Mexicans Americans and vice versa? Americans discriminate against Mexicans, according to Flores? Why? xtent do you agree with Flores's statement that "it's really the public this discrimination against Mexican people, it's not the government y"? What did Flores see as possible remedies for discrimination? QUESTIONS FOR READING AND DISCUSSION 1. Why did Long believe that people with wealth shoul .ith people needed it? What was the "obligation" of the nation? 2. According to Long what was wrong with the New Deal? In what ways people shackled far worse than slaves in 1860? 3. How would wealth redistribution work, according to Long? How would fer from existing New Deal programs? How did Long's program differ "the starvation dole"? DOCUMENT 24-5 Conservatives Criticize the New Deal grams and goals outraged many conservative Americans. Herbert Hoover, neglecting the suffering of poor Americans during his presidency, bitterly Few Deal of violating fundamental American ideals of liberty. Hoover's the presidential campaign of 1936, excerpted here, expressed the deeply held conservatives that the New Deal undermined rather than exemplified the merica. The following letter to Eleanor Roosevelt from Minnie A. Hardin, a Columbus, Indiana, detailed conservatives' objections to the consequences programs for struggling taxpayers and for those who received federal help. und Hardin disclosed assumptions about individuals and government com- e New Deal's conservative critics. .....www uit. Un, ye of little faith! God told them how. Appar- ently they are too lazy in mind or body to want to learn, so long as their ignorance is for the benefit of the 600 ruling families of America who have forged chains of slavery around the wrists and ankles of 125,000,000 free-born citizens. Lincoln freed the black man, but today the white and the black are shackled far worse than any colored person in 1860. The debt structure alone has condemned the American people to bondage worse than the Egyptians ever forged upon the Israelites. Right now America's debts, public and private, are $262,000,000,000, and nearly all of it has been laid on the shoulders of those who have nothing. It is a debt of more than $2,000 to every man, woman, or child. They can never pay it. They never have paid such debts. No one expects them to pay it. But such is the new form of slavery imposed tricksters, with the newspapers whom they have perverted, undertake to laugh to upon the civilization of America; and the street-corner sports and hired political scorn the efforts of the people to throw off this yoke and bondage, but we were told to do so by the Lord, we were told to do so by the Pilgrim Fathers, we were guaranteed such should be done by our Declaration of Independence and by the Constitution of the United States. Here is the whole sum and substance of the Share Our Wealth movement: 1. Every family to be furnished by the Government a homestead allowance, free of debt, of not less than one-third the average family wealth of the country, which means, at the lowest, that every family shall have the reasonable comforts of life up to a value of from $5,000 to $6,000. No person to have a fortune of more than 100 to 300 times the average family fortune, which means that the limit to fortunes is between $1,500,000 and $5,000,000, with annual capital levy taxes imposed on all above $1,000,000 2. The yearly income of every family shall not be less than one-third of the aver- age family income, which means that, according to the estimates of the statisti- cians of the United States Government and Wall Street, no family's annual income would be less than from $2,000 to $2,500. No yearly income shall be allowed to any person larger than from 100 to 300 times the size of the average family income, which means that no person would be allowed to earn in any year more than from $600,000 to $1,800,000, all to be subject to present income-taxi 3. To limit or regulate the hours of work to such an extent as to prevent overpro- duction; the most modern and efficient machinery would be encouraged, so that as much would be produced as possible so as to satisfy all demands of the people, but to also allow the maximum time to the workers for recreation, convenience, education, and luxuries of life. 4. An old age pension to the persons over 60. 5. To balance agricultural production with what can be consumed according to the laws of God, which includes the preserving and storage of surplus commodi- ties to be paid for and held by the Goverment for the emergencies when such are needed. Please bear in mind, however, that when the people of America have had money to buy things they needed, we have never had a surplus of any commod- ity. This plan of God does not call for destroying any of the things raised to eat or wear, nor does it countenance wholesale destruction of hogs, cattle, or milk. 6. To pay the veterans of our wars what we owe them and to care for their disabled. 7. Education and training for all children to be equal in opportunity in all schools, colleges, universities, and other institutions for training in the professions and DOCUMENT 24-4 A Mexican American Farmworker Describes the Importance of Sticking Together The New Deal's Farm Security Administration (FSA) tried to help migrant farma including tens of thousands of Mexican Americans and Okies fleeing the parched and mortgage foreclosures of the Dust Bowl. Between 1938 and 1941 two college st from New York visited FSA migrant labor camps in California to record migrants and interview farmworkers. President Roosevelt invited them to the White House some of their recordings. At the FSA camp in El Rio, California, just north of Los A1 they interviewed Jose Flores, a twenty-year-old Mexican American farmworker. His view, excerpted below, revealed the efforts of migrant workers to obtain better wages. also recounted the discrimination Mexican Americans confronted as they exercised rights as citizens ...00 T-Mobile LTE instructure-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com 3:06 PM @ 1 81% Herbert Hoover Anti-New Deal Campaign Speech, 1936 four years of experience this New Deal attack upon free institutions as the transcendent issue in America. men who are seeking for mastery in the world today are using the ns. They sing the same songs. They all promise the joys of Elysium Jose Flores Interview, Farm Security Administration Migrant Labor Camp, El Rio, California, 1941 Interviewer: Tell me about the set up you have in this camp here in El RI Flores: [The] Welfare Committee tries to see that the families are in a position concerning food or clothes, whatever clothes they can obtain fror church or some other offices or agencies, they try to distribute those cloth whoever needs them the worst.... We have a man that runs the employ office here. If a farmer comes in here and needs some help on his ranch, we his Challenge to Liberty," speech delivered in Denver, Colorado, Octo- ublished in Herbert Hoover, Addresses upon the American Road, 1933-1938 harles Scribner's Sons, 1938), pp. 216-27. Eleanor Roosevelt Papers, Series neous, 1937, Franklin D. Roosevelt Library In Greek mythology, the portion of the underworld reserved for the From Jose Flores, personal interview, 1941. Transcribed by the editor. Audio the Charles L. Todd and Robert Sonkin Migrant Worker Collection, Library of gress, American Folklife Center, Digital ID: AFCTS 5145a1 and 5145b1. mostly 4 of 4 cause the But their philosophy is founded on the coercion and compulsory organiza- tion of men. True liberal government is founded on the emancipation of men. This is the issue upon which men are imprisoned and dying in Europe right now.... Freedom does not die from frontal attack. It dies because men in power no longer believe in a system based upon liberty... I gave the warning against this philosophy of government four years ago from a heart heavy with anxiety for the future of our country. It was born from many years' experience of the forces moving in the world which would weaken the vitality of American freedom. It grew in four years of battle as President to uphold the banner of free men. And that warning was based on sure ground from my knowledge of the ideas that Mr. Roosevelt and his bosom colleagues had covertly embraced despite the Democratic platform Those ideas were not new. Most of them had been urged upon me. During my four years powerful groups thundered at the White House with these same ideas. Some were honest, some promising votes, most of them threat- ening reprisals, and all of them yelling "reactionary" at us. I rejected the notion of great trade monopolies and price-fixing through codes. That could only stifle the little business man by regimenting him under the big brother. That idea was born of certain American Big Business and grew up to be the NRA. I rejected the schemes of "economic planning to regiment and coerce the farmer. That was born of a Roman despot 1,400 years ago and grew up into the AAA. I refused national plans to put the government into business in competition with its citizens. That was born of Karl Marx. I vetoed the idea of recovery through stupendous spending to prime the pump. That was born of a British professor John Maynard Keynes). I threw out attempts to centralize relief in Washington for politics and social experimentation. I defeated other plans to invade States' rights, to centralize power in Washington. Those ideas were born of American radicals. I stopped attempts at currency inflation and repudiation of government obli- gation. That was robbery of insurance policy holders, savings bank depositors and wage-earners. That was born of the early Brain Trusters. I rejected all these things because they would not only delay recovery but because I knew that in the end they would shackle free men. Rejecting these ideas we Republicans had erected agencies of government which did start our country to prosperity without the loss of a single atom of American freedom.... Our people did not recognize the gravity of the issue when I stated it four years ago. That is no wonder, for the day Mr. Roosevelt was elected recovery was in progress, the Constitution was untrampled, the integrity of the government and the institutions of freedom were intact. It was not until after the election that the people began to awake. Then the realization of intended tinkering with the currency drove bank depositors into the panic that greeted Mr. Roosevelt's inauguration Recovery was set back for two years, and hysteria was used as the bridge to reach the goal of personal government I am proud to have carried the banner of free men to the last hour of the term my countrymen entrusted it to me. It matters nothing in the history of a race what happens to those who in their time have carried the banner of free men. What matters is that the battle shall go on. The people know now the aims of this New Deal philosophy of government. We propose instead leadership and authority in government within the moral and economic framework of the American System. We propose to hold to the Constitutional safeguards of free men. We propose to relieve men from fear, coercion and spite that are inevitable in personal government. We propose to demobilize and decentralize all this spending upon which vast personal power is being built. We propose to amend the tax laws so as not to defeat free men and free enterprise. We propose to turn the whole direction of this country toward liberty, not away from it. The New Dealers say that all this that we propose is a worn-out system, that this machine age requires new measures for which we must sacrifice some part of the freedom of men. Men have lost their way with a confused idea that govem- ments should run machines. Man-made machines cannot be of more worth than men themselves. Free men made these machines. Only free spirits can master them to their proper use. The relation of our government with all these questions is complicated and difficult. They rise into the very highest ranges of economics, statesmanship and morals. And do not mistake. Free government is the most difficult of all government. But it is everlastingly true that the plain people will make fewer mistakes than any group of men no matter how powerful. But free government implies vigilant thinking courageous living and self-reliance in a people. Let me say to you that any measure which breaks our dikes of freedom will flood the land with misery. and instead of picking up both partir + in the fi Mexicans mostly. Sometimes they'll p ican felld just to make it look good. But still tt and throwing them in the can instea up both parties a lesson. They seem to teach an peop! of being a lesson they enforce the ides exican be next year and fight them (American b of the fight or the decision, so the offi throwth I: What do you think can be don F: Well, the only thing that I feel t ne about people's clubs or older people's clubs too ana contacting di clubs and telling them about discrimination against Mexica the only way that I feel it could be done, that something because it's really the public who makes this discrimin people, it's not the government particularly, it's the public I: You were saying something a while ago about what t| about discrimination. F: Well, in Los Angeles they tried to get together and fi cases a certain Mexican fellow applies for a job and the pla they couldn't give him a job because he's a Mexican, this a longs to, they try to contact the manager or the superinter explain to him that even though he's a Mexican he's drafted country for the army and he's gotta do every other thing t can citizen does, so why shouldn't he be allowed to have good job that he can depend on? If he has to do every other can citizen does for the benefit of the country, why should have a good job or else the individual manager of the pl good job. You're expected to be a good citizen. They only w good citizens out of Mexican people is treating them like A 1: Do you think they make good citizens? F: Oh, absolutely, they sure will. I know they will they're just treated the right way. 1: Do you think the project like this camp that we're training people to be good citizens? F: I feel that it does a lot of good to the people. And i of good to become good citizens, a camp like this will. I car of getting together that do get together it helps a lot. I: For cooperation F: For cooperation and to educate them. Because what good that it's doing is to education mostly, showing the together they can get somewhere. 1: Have you ever been on the (camp governingl coun this in self-government? F: No, they've never had a self-governing council like 1: The council here works according to the democratic F: That's right 1: What do you think about that? Do you think that educating them? F: There is one good thing in educating. It gives the de at least because everybody has a right to vote and make de ..000 T-Mobile LTE A instructure-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com 3:06 PM @ 1 81% Minnie Hardin Letter to Eleanor Roosevelt, December 14, 1937 Mrs. Roosevelt: I suppose from your point of view the work relief, old age pensions, slum clearance and all the rest seems like a perfect remedy for all the ills of this country, but I would like for you to see the results, as the other half see them. We have always had a shiftless, never-do-well class of people whose one and only aim in life is to live without work. I have been rubbing elbows with this class for nearly sixty years and have tried to help some of the most promising and have seen others try to help them, but it can't be done. We cannot help those who will *NRA: Here, the National Recovery Administration. AAA: Agricultural Adjustment Act. "Brain Trusters: A group of economists and professors who advised Franklin D. Roosevelt.
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